New Years Eve Jam-Rumors And Cooters

Rumor's NYE Jam

Chad Johnson-lead vocals
Jeff Mattison-guitar
Mark Adams-bass
Tom Miller-Host Drummer
I played drums.

Songs;

Sister Golden Hair
Moondance
Happy Birthday Fuckface
The Middle



Cooters-KICK IT Band with Dan Hartman

With:
Tommy Bruner-Guitar
Dan Hartman-Acoustic Guitar
Robby Wallace-Vocals and bongos
Mike Williams-Guitar and vocals
Eddie Jarrell-Bass
Rocky Smith-Drums

I played  drums on

Luckenbach Texas
God Bless The USA
Sharp Dressed Man

It was nice to have a change of new hosts on the Rumor's New Year's Eve jam.  Terry's band was playing in Wapello and put together Past Masters' vocalist Chad Johnson and the retired Tom Miller on drums plus Jeff Mattison on guitar.  I have rarely jammed with Jeff but he has a very eclectic tastes by offering up on the jazzy Moondance, to which I have done before with The EGADS and Jimmy Eat World's The Middle was the first time I ever played drums too. Chad is a showman extraordinaire and it was fun to watch in and Jeff clown around on some songs.   I missed Jeff Overly since I got there late, but caught up with him at The Shack when he was helping Karl Hudson and Peter Cacioppo with The Buzz and I checked out a set from them.

I thought about going to see Crazy Delicious at CRL but they had a five dollar cover charge, so I opted to head to Cooters and catch up on Dan Hartman and the Kick It band.   I did two country songs with them and Sharp Dressed Man with Mike Williams doing vocals.

NOTES:  for the first time ever.  I went to Cooters and no fights broke out.  Ernest was there and like the Rumors jam, he reprised his Bring It On Home/The Twist medley   He didn't need no mic to shout out the words.

I didn't intend to play drums at Cooters but Rocky asked me if I wanted to and so I did.  I opted for the country numbers just to keep it simple.  Never did God Bless The USA before.  It's better than doing Mustang Sally, to which Rocky did.

It was fun to see Tom Miller again.  I certainly miss him in Past Masters (although Keith Lindsay does a fine job on drums).  After my little set, they were wanting him back on stage, and started playing Angel Eyes without him.  He finally came out of the bathroom after the first verse.

The weather was minus 20 when I got home and got a distressed note from Rocky saying his truck broke down in Springville and needed a ride back home.  So I got there just in time to meet Dan Hartman, who came in from Marion and it was decided that I would take him home to Monticello. Nobody should be out in this frigid weather, especially when your thermostat quits working in your car and you blow a heater hose.   That happened to me 5 years ago when I went to see Samantha Fish in Davenport and had to spend the night there.   Global warming?  Not here, it's the new ice age.

So I got Rocky home safe and he gave me twenty dollars in the process.  Would have done it for less, but us musicians do have to look after each other in times of need.  Especially when it's 20 below.

The Final Show Of Logic And Lies-Artisan Sanctuary 12/28/17

Song List:

Logic And Lies
Drawn In The Dark
If I Were A Carpenter
Get It Over With
Mercury Blues
The One That Knows Me Best
Teri, My Love


With:
Colton Thompson, Ed Butler, Stuart Pershing, Demerits Harris

Jim Jacobmeyer: host
Patrick Lower: Sound guy between here and the bar for some band playing next door.

What started as a year long tour of acoustic jams and gigs ends on a snowy evening at the Sanctuary in front of 10 people.  I  have gotten used to the musician's crowd, and since it's still a holiday week and the snow and cold has come along, I didn't think we would have much of a crowd.  I think the best crowd I've seen was Whittier or Waubeek although I left the Rumors jam out of the equation.
This was basically the guitar side of things.  Despite the snow and cold Ed Butler did pop up from Riverside and so did Stuart Pershing but I left during Stu's set to grab a pizza and chat with Tony Nickles before going home.

I had no problems with the first two songs and did a false take on Get It Over With while trading barbs with Colton.  Colton got himself a new job detailing cars and has to get up at 5 AM just to get there, so he had to call it an early evening.  Patrick had to do sound for a blues band two doors down so he didn't do any of his songs.  I could have made it a headlining thing since Ed and Stuart were the only other performers (Demerits  came late to the party) but decided to do a 20 minute set including the song that won Jim Jacobmeyer over right off the bat.  I replaced the strings on the Ibanez and that became my go to guitar.  I did bring the Guild just in case Julie felt well enough to play but the weather played a role, and  she had to work so I didn't plan on her being there.  She went above and beyond the call of duty last night.

The One That Knows Me Best got debut for the first time but somehow I couldn't get the final line of that song at the end of the final chorus.  But I did conclude my set with a good version of Teri and then turned it over to Ed, were he surprised us with Camarillo Brillo from Frank Zappa.  Stuart then did a few interesting songs (Seven Turns, Two Hangman) and even a version of Every Mother's Son from Skynyrd, a song that I have practiced singing but never did play that one live yet.

And so it ends.  For 2017 that is.   Next year will bring more surprises and more jams along the way.  But for now I think I'll take the rest of this year off.

Thanks everybody!  It's been a great year!

Checkers' Acoustic Showcase 12/27/17

Set list:

Unchained Melody
Logic And Lies
Drawn In The Dark
Mercury Blues
Poor Poor Pitiful Me
For What It's Worth
Gold Dust Woman
Lovesong
Take It To The Limit
Turn The Page
Night Moves
Good Lovin
Ring Of Fire
Folsom Prison Blues
Mama Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Cowboys
Your Cheating Heart
Crazy Mama
Sweet Home Alabama

(and a few more songs that escaped me)

I sang on Logic And Lies, Drawn In The Dark, Ring Of Fire, Good Lovin
Julie Gordon sang and played guitar on the majority of the songs
Carl Meiners sang on Folsom Prison, Mama, Me And Bobby McGee, Your Cheating Heart
Dave Bonham sang on Take It To the Limit and Turn The Page
Richard played perucssion and sang backup
Rusty sang as well.

Julie Gordon And Dave Bonham were the hosts

Sonya Madden along with her Mom and Jason showed up.  Sonya took plenty of pictures.

(Jules and Acousta Crabby)

Julie has been stuck with the flu ever since coming back from California and tonight was the first time she felt better.  I'd say she was 50 percent better than she was last week, but even for a 2 and half hour jam, it did drained her as she fought through coughing and hacking and losing her voice.  For being sick, she sang quite well and looked great.  It was nice seeing my coworker Sonya popped up, just like she promised.

The intent was to limit Julie on singing but she sang along with me on For What Its Worth  before taking over Gold Dust Woman and Lovesong.  She sang Unchained Melody before I did my set and the two songs from Logic And Lies.  A new guy named Richard (who plays at Stone City Sunday Jams) did a lot of percussion work and sang too.  I also played along with Dave Bonham on a lot of songs that I wasn't familiar with and had to rely on him to show me the chords but Crazy Mama for a first time ever, wasn't too bad.

(with Dave Bonham)

Anyway, it was yet another musician's crowd tonight, the bonechilling weather didn't help things and people were getting ready to celebrate New Year's so hardly anybody was there.  Carl Meiners didn't leave for Arizona just yet so he was drafted to do a few songs.

(Carl Meiners, me, Richard, Rusty, Julie)

(with Sonya's mom Patty)

(and Sonya too!)

Notes:  Dave announced that he is going to be into the Davenport Blues Hall Of Fame in March.  Congratulations!

End Of Year Thoughts From The Townedger

It's Christmas here and I'm trying to comprehend all of the things that happened to me this year.  No I didn't get rich and famous but good enough to play at some jams and even headlined a couple on my own.   They weren't paying gigs and it was mostly musician's crowds but I had the most fun sharing the stage with a lot of folks this year.

There was Logic And Lies, the album I did this spring and summer and like most Townedgers album it was about love, failed love and then redemption and amazingly finding love at the end of the dance. That has not happened in quite a while.

Somewhere in this picture lies the one that has captured my heart.  Who for the most of the year was my favorite singing partner at the local jams and somehow she thought that I was  somebody worth being with.  I always loved her from afar, and looked at our friendship and stage presence together being something special.  Those who saw us share the stage knew we had a special bond but I was out of practice in the dating field and it showed.  We did finally go out on Memorial Day, but it still took time and effort for anything to happen.  Mostly on her end.  I guess out of all the musicians that were available I was the one that sat in the background admiring her from a distance, but history has shown that I never been lucky in love and romance and didn't want to jeopardize what we had together.  She had her own gigs, her own life, and so did I.   But every time I seen her play with the Mad Dogs or D.O.A, she always sang to me with a smile and a wink, I think she sang for me.  She along with the other Acousta Kitties got me to sing and play guitar on stage.  I never know what I did to make her fall for me but through this year we seem to draw closer together, even though there were times that we went on our lives and we go through times which we wouldn't talk.  But even then, she was always on my mind and wasn't about to go away even if I did for a while.  Then when she hosted the acoustic gigs, we be back together and things were just like before.   I helped out when Mike Serbousek broke his finger and I played drums for about 12 songs on Labor Day Weekend with The Mad Dogs, and helped her and Ryan when they played Anamosa and Solon in October.  Then on December 3rd, she became my new love.  I'm still pitching myself to see if this still is a dream. 

This year I continue to do the Rumors Jam, with Terry McDowell and still got to play along with some of the finest musicians in town.   But once I started doing more guitar songs and stuff,  I started going to other jams.  The Whittier Acoustic Showcase was one, The Artisan Sanctuary in Marion the other one, the latter more on original stuff although the Whittier jams I do more obscure songs as well. The Long Branch Jams with Tony Nickels have been a positive including a epic showcase with Tony's dad Zac playing drums.  And then there's the Parlor City Blues Jam on Tuesday Nights that have been fun.   And then finally I did my first Waubeek jam in November, which ended in a fight and the next month I played more drums than guitar.  The original thought remains that Waubeek would be drums only and Whittier guitar.  But the best fun remains the Checker's Acoustic Jam be it Cathy Hart and Lorie Parker or Julie Gordon and special guest stars.   Or when Jeff Overly comes up from Fort Madison to jam.

This year, i was part of the band collective known as the EGADS! (Everything Good And Decent) and while the band was me, Belinda James, Mark Randolph, Tim Nemec and Larry Axelman, we never got to share the stage together.  It was Belinda, Mark and myself when we did the Vinton benefit along with guest stars Mike Clair, Rich Toomsen, Jeff Langenberg, Barth Walter and Kim Bean.  And then with the Rubies Benefit, only Belinda remained.  Tim Nemec ended up leaving the band due to health issues.  He was surely missed.

In July, Donna Jo hosted the annual Cabin On The River Jam and that was my first stage appearance as a solo artist.  Wooden Nickel Lottery was the host band and I managed to sat in on drums on a few songs, but for my set Rich Toomsen played guitar and Mark Awad played bass and Delayne Stallman played drums.  The interaction between Rich and Mark on For What Its Worth was worth the price of admission.  Too bad nobody recorded it.

During Rumors jams I managed to play drums with some of the best in town. Rick Clay is one of the most bad ass guitar players out there and we connected on the song Dreams I'll Never See Again to which I managed to play in his band Four Day Creep.   Terry McDowell doesn't usually have a full drum set but he did on this late August sessions to which I found myself sharing the stage with Ryan Paul,  Kenny Webb and even Tim Wiley from the old Wiley Kats band that we had going in 2016.  A speed metal version of Crossroads was in order.  Poor Ken  was trying to keep it all steady.

Four Day Creep in June 2017 at Wild Hogs

In September, I decided to take a venture into the open mic nights at the Artisan Sanctuary and managed to be a hit when I performed Logic And Lies the song and it turned into an anthem of sorts.  I enjoyed the variety of people who performed, actors, poets, comedian, karaoke singers and other musicians, Phil Koening in particular. And Colton Thompson an youngster that had the best vocals I have heard from a teenager.  Having time off from work made me available to do these weeknight jams, including the Long Branch Friday Acoustic Jam.

For all intent purposes, it was the Checker's Acoustic Jam that I was better known at. It started out with the Acousta Kitties and then after the breakup it became one week Hart/Parker, next week Julie Jules and Friends  While I had fun jamming with the gang, the one omission was that I only did one get together with Russ Swearingen at his place while playing guitar and there was misunderstanding with Dewayne on a Rumors Jam appearance and he opted out.  Russ did show up to take some pictures at a acoustic gig and managed to get the only picture of me and Julie together on stage all year.  Perhaps our shining moment was when we did Gold Dust Woman for the first time and she knew where to sing the lyrics during my primitive guitar playing.  Certainly there's other that can sing this song.  Julie has always made Gold Dust Woman  her own.

Among the more eccentric guitar players, Ed Butler has the best songlist that I have heard in the times he done the Rumor's Jam and one epic performance at the Long Branch.  His version of Wicked Game you have to hear.  Plus he did Matty Groves one day.  Ed knows music.

A year after coming out of the bedroom to play guitar and the results were beyond my wildest dreams although it's all exposure and no money to be made.  Karl Hudson was kind enough to tip me 10 dollars on his acoustic jam at Gilligan's this spring.  The Whittier Jams were fun to participate in. David Lau a great host.  The stage fright has always been there but the support of friends and fellow musicians I could overcome that fear.  I think I made a list of each and every musician whose names I knew I gave thanks tor sharing the stage with.  They did manage to make me sound that much better in due time.

As for The Townedgers, I thank Geoff Redding and Martin Daniels for their support in turning my ideas into great songs.  Terry Bainbridge instrumental in capturing that drum sound that's hard to get.  I thank Diggy Kat for his support of the music of the TEs and myself.

Here's hoping that 2018 will continue to bring out the surprises and good vibes that I enjoyed in 2017.  The future looks bright.

Acousta Crabby Acoustic Jam At Checkers 12/20/17

Song List:

Heard It In A Love Song*
The Last Time
For What Its Worth
Everybody's Talking
Life
Long Hard Road
Your Cheatin Heart
Folsom Prison Blues
Boobyful

With:
Greg Mein-Lead Vocals*, backing vocals, lead guitar
Brenda Hoskins-Mein-Piano on The Last Time
Donna Jo Eisner-Backing vocals (For What It's Worth, Everybody's Talking)
Carl Meiners-Lead vocals and guitar (Life-Folsom Prison Blues)
Lorie Parker-Lead vocals on Boobyful, backing vocals; Your Cheatin Heart)
Cathy Hart-Backing vocals, mandolin and guitar (Life-Boobyful)
I played guitar and sang lead on The Last Time-Everybody's Talking) Congas on the rest.

Also:
Steve Black Wolf and Sofia Chesney did a couple songs earlier, which I played congas

It's A Heartache
Daydream
Feliz Navidad

Tommy Bruner was there to sing a few numbers including a Steve Earle cover, Someday.

Tim Canfield stopped over to say Hello.

Donna Jo with a friend of hers Teri Johnson
(in the back is Lorie Parker, Myself, Greg Mein and Brenda Hoskins-Mein.  I'm thinking we just got done Heard It In A Love Song)

It was Carl's birthday celebration and plenty of folks were there.  There was a teenager that was there two weeks ago and came back and did about a half hour of covers.  Greg and Brenda were on hand, and Brenda was under the weather, just like so many people.  Her voice gave out after Stop Draggin My Heart Around.

Due to the lateness of the jams, I limited myself to three songs to which Greg helped out.  Basically the three songs that I could remember the lyrics except for one flubbed line.   Donna Jo popped up to help sing the backing vocals to For What Its Worth and Everybody's Talking.   And then the birthday boy Carl relieved me and of course he had to do Your Cheating Heart, to which Cathy Hart had to be her funny self and had us all laughing with her antics.

(Teri Johnson: Photo.  D.J., Carl Meiners, Greg Mein)

The jam lasted longer than usual, ending at 10 25 actually.  A good time was had by all.

Notes:  This jam marked one whole year since I started playing guitar on stage in front of people after 35 years of learning how to play guitar.  It's amazing how far I have come to play songs and getting kudos from other people.   Joe Hutchcroft and Skip Richards were the original guys to back me up and they remain a vital part of my music history.   I have come a long way.

Artisan Acoustic Showcase 12/14/17

Setlist:


Listen To Love
Be With Me
Get It Over With
Logic And Lies

(Photo gallery by Jim Jacobmeyer)

Tommy Bruner showed up and really gave some words of encouragement.  He said that I should consider playing more guitar at future shows rather than just drums only.   He was in the neighborhood checking out the Sirenz at Ramsey's then came down to the Sanctuary to play a couple songs, although he didn't have his own guitar I offered the Guild but he opted for Phil Koeing's Fender Stat instead.

It was a musician's crowd. nothing but musicians supporting one another but I thought it was one of the best showcases that we had, including Colton Thompson and his amazing vocal on the karaoke songs.  He talked about going on the X Factor and doing something there.  I think he got the vocal chops to pull it off.

Note: Stuart Pershing was one of the newcomers to the jam.  But I have seen him play the Whittier Jam a couple months ago.

Phil Koening


Jim Jacobmeyer mentioned that this was the best open mic jam ever even though we had a musician's crowd.  There was a couple of flubs on my part but my set got a good reaction from the folks who showed up.  I know having Tommy close the jam was the perfect ending.  He does quite well with the Past Masters and covers but his originals are even better.

On the way home, I made a brief hello at Ramsey's to see Sirenz, the band of Cathy, Lorie and Barb who finished up their set and still were up there.


Rumors Sunday Jam

Two Songs

Kim Trevellion-Lead vocal on Drift Away
Tommy Bruner-Lead guitar, lead vocal on Superstition
Mike Clair-Lead Guitar
Jeremiah Murphy-Bass Guitar
I did drums.

Thanks to Jean Gilmore, Brenda Snow, Rick Wiegal, Tim Canfield, DJ Hovenstat, Herm Sarduy, Kim Mishmash, Mike Lint, Jim Reisner and Terry McDowell for the fun.

Julie Gordon was missed.

Sunday Funday Rumors Jam

With

Greg Mein-Lead Vocals and guitar
Brenda Hoskins-Mein-Keyboards and vocals
Michael Clair-Guitar
Jeremiah Murphy-Bass
R.Smith-Drums

Songs:

Mary Jane's Last Dance
Breakdown
Little Wing
The Weight


Host: Terry McDowell.
Tommy Bruner-Host Guitarist

Jeff Overly-Sax and vocals beforehand.

A quiet get together today.  Not a lot of jammers and Rob Haskell and Trevor Worcel were the other two drummers on board today.   Jeff Overly came up from Ft. Madison to play and had to leave at 6 to get home so we didn't partake in any jams.

Greg and Brenda showed up at 6 and relived a tired Tommy Bruner to finish the final half hour of this jam.  They started out with The Last Time and Stop Draggin My Heart Around to which Trevor didn't quite to make of the melody.  He also sat in on Amie and the forth song which escapes me.  Could have been a Tom Petty song.

The first two numbers were Tom Petty numbers of course.  Brenda didn't bring the flute so we basically stayed with the other numbers.  Plus we got to do The Weight.  I've been chompin at the bit to play that song live with them.


I chatted with Jim Reisner from Flawed Logic for a bit and then Greg and Brenda before checking on Julie's puppy as I made my way back home.  Now that Julie is a regular part of this life we been trading song ideas to do.  She decided on Unchained Melody, the old Righteous Brothers hit that made the charts on the Ghost movie many years ago.  This comes from a woman that used to do Warm Leatherette by Grace Jones or Dominance And Submission by BOC.   Nothing ever surprises me from Julie and knowing what she can do.

For the past year I been documenting the live shows and jams as a reference of what songs to play and the people have come into this musical journey. And document The Townedgers but as the year passed  by, it seems I have shifted over to a solo career and leaving Geoff and Martin in the past.  The different jams, Whittier, Waubeek, The Cabin Jam, and the Rubies Benefit Part 1 to which part 2 I was too ill to play.  And of course The Checker's Jam.   Somehow in me documenting this year's journey that somehow Julie became much more involved in the music, as well as life itself.  Never saw that coming.   I knew we had a good musical connection on stage.  But never thought that she would set her sights on me.   Somehow she would not let me go quietly into the night.  While jamming with the rest of the musicians out there, I made no secret of who my favorite singers are.  The EGADS! may have been my own band but I felt a sense of pride of playing a half set with Julie And The Mad Dogs and enjoyed sharing music together with Julie most of all.   I might have participated on  jams and songs with other singers but Julie was the one that I had the most fun with. She made it a priority to get me to smile and she succeeded.

More than she knows.

(Thanks Terry for letting me close the Sunday Jam)

Whittier-Set List 12/9/17

Songs;

Logic And Lies
Tulsa Time
It's My Time
The Race Is On
Summertime Blues

Notes:

An electric show, I used the Gorilla Amp along with the Fender Telecaster.
Carl Meiners helped out on Race Is On and Tulsa Time

Waubeek Jam-Clean Up On The Main Stage

Songs:

Spoonful
Mercury Blues
Cinnamon Girl
For What Its Worth
I'm A Man/Rock Me Baby

With:
Kirksey: Vocals and guitar on For What It's Worth/I'm A Man

The Waubeek jam Band (With John Hein (Big Mo), Phil Koening, Kirksey, Carl Meiners)

To finish this week's gigs, I did Waubeek at F B Company and Mark Devo bought some real drums, so I helped out the gang on some songs but couldn't figure out how  to play Dixie Chicken. It just didn't happen. But on the plus side they did mentioned that the songs I did drum on that I knew really gave them that added edge missing.   They all played pretty good.

Of course, like the last time, I ended up being the next to final act to play guitar and sing and by then, most of the regulars went home again (sigh). Perhaps they had too much fun on the drum numbers, I know we extended Bring It On Home to the point of being excessive but the guys put on a great groove.  Phil Koening and I jammed a bit on the songs and while Big Mo may not be the best drummer, he is a ferocious bass player.

The songs I sang I didn't need cheat sheets to. They were improvised like I'm A Man and Rock Me Baby to which Kirksey sang I'm A Man and I added some Captain Beefheart/Tom Waits growls on Rock Me Baby.  I think there were a couple of hecklers in the audience but they basically left after Spoonful.  I guess I made some nice background noise while the patrons drank a few beers and watch television.

Overall, more fun when I was playing drums and having a few folks on stage but it was worthy of practicing in front a live audience, even if I wore myself out playing drums earlier.


For the first time in months, I passed on the Rumors Jam, and spending the afternoon with Julie and playing songs together on guitar.  D J Hovenstat had his birthday today and I'm sure he had a great time jamming with Bruner,Bear,Bird and Terry.  For myself, it was nice to hang with Julie more.  She really does have a way to make me smile.  Especially when she was singing Walking After Midnight, walking with me to the car in the moonlight light.

And then gave me a goodnight kiss.

Artisan Sanctuary Showcase 11/30/17-Solo and Otherwise

Songs:

Spoonful
Mercury Blues
Be With Me
Drawn In The Dark
Fever

Encore  (With Kimberly Trevallion)

Gold Dust Woman
Kansas City Blues (attempted)
Fire
Poor Poor Pitiful Me

Photos by Jim Jacobmeyer

I really didn't intend to do much outside of a block of four songs and off to do other things, but since Kim was in attendance and was looking for a guitar player to help her, the only thing I could come up with was Gold Dust Woman, and Kim's version is more Halestorm than Stevie Nicks, which kinda threw me off course.   I know Julie is Fleetwood Mac and we have done it enough to play off each other toward the end.  Kim, on the other hand, is one of the most powerful vocalists in this town and she's very schooled in the blues. She lit up the crowd on Gold Dust Woman, hitting the higher octaves and back to the chorus again.  Alas, I didn't know the songs she did best, You Got A Friend or Drift Away, actually I did.....if I played drums. I used the capo on the 4th fret on Fire, to which it sounded like the Pointer Sisters than Bruce and was in her vocal range and Poor Poor Pitiful Me, a compromise at the end after she was going through my songbook of songs I could do.  I think in the near future if we share the stage again I'll need to work on Drift Away or Cold Shot, or simply go to see Blue Scratch and check out their songs and figure what to do next.

Spoonful and Mercury Blues were reprise d from the Checker's gig and both sounded pretty damn angry.  I told the story of Be With Me, to which I was so smitten with somebody that I wrote a song and sang it for her and while she thought that was a sweet gesture, but still didn't want nothing to do with me and to which I yelled out BITCH at the end and folks got a good laugh out of that.

The story behind Be With Me, was our guitar player broke up with a cool woman and I thought I would ease her pain by writing a song about asking her out and seeing if she would get the message. She did liked the song but by then, she was dating somebody else.

I ended up my segment by playing Fever and not Logic And Lies which Jim Jacobmeyer was going to request as a encore number, but I ended up accompanying Kim on three songs, so I didn't see the need to play that song.  But I have to the next time we meet up.  I did notice the cd that I gave Jim to hear was on the table waiting for somebody to pick up.  

(Let's see what this button does, Philbo, working his magic)

Patrick Lower, who usually does sound was very sick so Phil Bo King  took over for sound and gave me a bit of echo that would keep feeding back into my ears so I had to back away from the mic. Craig took pictures, Colton once again sang great and he needs a band to back him up.  Mike Lint is a good singer to Karaoke stuff, Colton is better.  That's saying something.  We might have to learn to do some Bon Jovi songs to get a real band behind Colton.

Checker's Acoustic Showcase 11/29/17

Songlist:

I Won't Back Down
Fire
Spoonful
Mercury Blues
Boom Boom (Snippet)
Everybody's Talking
Jet Airliner
For What It's Worth
Gold Dust Woman
Come Together
Summertime Blues
Man Of Constant Sorrow
Love Song
Stand By Me

With
Steve Black Wolf-Lead Vocals 1,14
Julie Gordon-Lead Vocals 2,9.10,12,13
Tony Nickels-Percussion

And

Carl Meiners
PJ and Pam Harrington
Craig Mccune

And the regulars at Checker's Tavern

Let's Jam Hosted by Julie Gordon/Steve Black Wolf


Do we dictate on how the jam is going to be if we play it rough and mad?  I think it brings out the best in the other jammers of course.  Things didn't start out very well since the the GD cup of tea I had in the car tipped over and I ended up getting a wet seat.  I can't get a decent day no matter what I do.

Dave Bonham caught the flu, so Steve took over and helped Julie and I supposed I added something to the equation.  Steve took care of the Tom Petty song and Julie did Fire, which thankfully her vocals were a big upgrade than the toad croak I did Friday Night.  I have to say that tonight's performance was a lot more inspired than what happened over the weekend.  And the songs were made up as we went along, even when Tony was playing the pocket drums on Spoonful, he even managed to follow the choppy to straight beat on the lead part.  Geez another lead guitar specialist now playing coffee cans behind me, just like Rich Toomsen.  I'm supposed to be playing drums.  I worked on Mercury Blues this afternoon and managed to remember most of the lyrics, in fact I didn't use my cheat sheets tonight.  The first couple songs were improvised on the spot,  Spoonful and Mercury Blues   Julie was used a lot during my set, she sang backup on For What Its Worth and went along on Gold Dust Woman on the extended ending.  And of course Come Together.  We did work on Fire Sunday Night and was mostly in the neighborhood of how the song went tonight. She is such a lover of music, when you find the right song for her, she can sing the hell out of it.  She did reach deep down inside on the finale of Gold Dust Woman.  After Summertime Blues, I went back to playing on the side, and didn't know  how Love Song by The Cure went although Man Of Constant Sorrow worked better.

I really pounded on the guitar, the repetitive  two note riff to Spoonful, and the odd time bar chord to Mercury Blues really were the highlights and it was great to have Tony join the jam on a rare occasion, he does the Long Branch Jam on Friday Nights to which I have to take a rain check on. I do like my Guild guitar better than the Ibanez, I'm sure the Ibanez would have had half the strings breaking on tonight's gig.

Afterwards PJ, the owner of the Checkers complimented me on the way that I play, which I was very humbled to hear.  Thought about asking him if I was good enough to have The Townedgers play Checekrs in the future, but I would need more songs,more polish and a actual band to boot.  Oh, and more ambition wouldn't hurt either.


Notes;  Carl was under the weather and decided not to play on stage.  Steve was finally getting over his cold and Julie was still dealing with her cold but despite that,  she was in a perky mood....Although the Rumors Jam the past few weeks have been packed with jammers, the weeknight jams have been single digit performers. Basically it was Julie, Steve, Tony and myself doing the songs and playing.  Of course Steve was telling me to hurry it up while I was grabbing a taco salad for supper and the jalapenos packed a wallop tonight.

Long Branch Acoustic Showcase-Electric Solo

Song list:

Sweet Jane (Abbreviated)
Fever
Fire*
Logic And Lies
Drawn In The Dark
Midnight Rider
The Last Time
Tulsa Time
Light My Fire
Just To Satisfy You
Dead Flowers
Switch Board Susan
Poor Poor Pitiful Me (Abbreviated)
Everybody's Talking
Keep Your Hands To Yourself
Sweet Home Alabama/Werewolves Of London

Tony Nickels-Percussion and mandolin

*debut

Not exactly a memorable night.  It was just me and Tony doing the showcase tonight and I ran out of gas after our off the wall attempt to do Sweet Home Alabama.  It was the second straight week of gone electric and Tony loved the sound of the Tele.

For some reason I couldn't get into Sweet Jane nor Poor Poor Pitiful me and scrapped them since I couldn't register the riffs on the latter song and the former needs more polishing.  There was an attempt to cover Fire but that didn't work as well either.  However one of the patrons still hanging around complimented me on a good job on the vocals.

I don't know what happened along the way.  I did stop and see Doug Spinler's band Palamino and wished PJ at Checkers' a happy birthday and had Chinese at Crossroads Bistro.  Probably the no shows played a role of not being as inspired and my voice kept giving out too.

If nothing else, Tony was glad to see that I made it.  And that the night was more bearable to him too.

Rumors Jam-Triple Guitar Attack 11/26/17

Mike Clair-Guitar
Brook Hoover-Guitar and vocal on Triple Guitar Attack Jam
Tommy Bruner-Guitar
Dan Johnson-Bass
Ernest The Soul Man-Vocal on Bring It On Home
R. Smith-Drums
Terry McDowell-Host

Songs:
Bring It On Home
Triple Guitar Attack Jam


Another packed crowd and a whole lot of jammers but I managed to do the last two songs before Comfortably Numb ended the show. I don't think Terry was in the best of moods, we didn't speak much except when he introduced me to the stage after I relieved Trevor Worcel when  Ernest did The Twist song, but I got to do Bring It On Home.  Thankfully Brook Hoover ended my segment with a 7 minute long jam song to which everybody got to do some showing off as well. I Threw a few dollars in the tip jar to show my appreciation   Thought about going home to watch a DVD and take a nap but Julie was up there and we decided to go over to her place and jam to a couple of songs.   I'm not sure if we attempt to do Fire at her jam but we'll see.

Patrick Geisland's band did about four songs including something called So Long, which I thought was quite catchy but I noticed that the ride cymbal stand was knocked over during a song, which didn't please Terry at all, (can't blame him).  Dana Rocky Smith and Bird did five songs together, then Herman Sarduy did a couple songs, then Rob Haskill before Terry returned with the Rock Brigade and did three lengthy songs (Stranglehold, Fly Me Couragous, I Don't Know). Notables up there beside Julie and Dave Bonham were Ed Butler, Nick Lenescka, Brenda Snow and her friend, Tami Soukup, Kim Mishmash, Lana Oliver who got married, Rick and Andi Clay, Troy Mitchell to name a few.  Troy opted not to play but Rick did a fantastic job on Stranglehold.   I would have gone to the Stone City Jam had Brook Hoover not up there and I'm sure Terry wanted to kill Pat after his drumming expose, but Pat is one of the hardest hitting drummers around.  Perhaps next time Terry may have to mention to Pat to bring his own drumset up there, since I'm sure he'll be replacing the drum heads once again.  I might have gotten a earache out of all this but I did think that Pat and his band did a rocking job on their mini set.  Kenny Webb played bass on a few sets.

Notes; Julie sang with Ed on Jolene.  Ed also did Sultans Of Swing to which the Hermanador messed up the final verse and chorus.

I think Ernest lobbied hard for me to play his songs. I'd love to play The Twist song with him in the near future.  But that hasn't been the case.  It's Terry's jam and those who there early get on stage early.  I'm there to support the cause.

There are photos taken and Kevin Simnacher took a video and some pictures but there are none of me playing drums.  Don't think it's worth the time nor effort to post anyway. Look hard enough and you'll find them on You Tube.

Checkers Acousta Crabby Showcase-Mark Awad Returns

The songs:

Poor Poor Pitiful Me
The Race Is On
I Won't Back Down
Fever
Summertime Blues
Tulsa Time
Just To Satisfy You (Snippet)
Love's Made A Fool Out Of You
Everybody's Talking
For What Its Worth
Let's Work Together
First Cut Is The Deepest

With:

Mark Awad-Bass
Willie Morris-Guitar
Donna Jo Eisner-Backing Vocal (For What It's Worth, Let's Work Together)

And The Sirenz

Cathy Hart
Lorie Parker
Barb Myers

Photo: Cathy Hart
Barb Myers, R. Smith, Lorie Parker, Willie Morris, Donna Jo, Mark Awad



Checker's Bar 11/22/17  Hosted by Hart/Parker

Interesting night to start out with.  I wanted some great Chinese food so I had supper at Crossroads Bistro and there was Rick Clay and Troy Mitchell from Four Day Creep with Rick's wife Andi and their daughter.  A friend Jason popped up later.  Troy and Jason ended up getting some of the hottest food out there and it was so spicy hot that Troy ended up hiccuping after a while.  Nice of them to invite me over to their table for a while.  They were off to Dennis McMurrin's birthday bash and from what I heard the place was packed.  Happy birthday Daddy O!

Since it was Thanksgiving Eve not a lot of jammers showed up but for the first time since the Cabin Jam at Troy Mills, Mark Awad came out and played bass on my segment along with Willie who is part of the country band The Gamblers.  Cathy was dealing with a cold and didn't sing much tonight. I played the Guild while standing up, it's hard to do when I don't have a guitar strap and had to basically hold my guitar in a death hold.   This was the first time that I jammed with Mark since the Cabin Jam in Troy Mills this summer and it was great to see him again. He added a bass solo to For What Its Worth and Willie did an extended guitar solo on Everybody's Talking.

Nothing really new and I'm getting better at covering up the mistakes to the words.  I still can't figure out how to sing The Race Is On but I do okay with the chorus. Steve Black Wolf was missing tonight so I did I Won't Back Down.  Without Belinda or Julie around, I end up doing Fever in a boogie sort of way.  Carl Meiners wasn't around and he might have migrated to Arizona for the winter. With Abigail Bunker, we had the same amount of players as we did last week, 8.

Next up: The Long Branch on Friday.

Rich Magoon Celebration Of Life Jam

Rumors-Wess Side Jam  (Brenda Snow-Photos Credit)

With:

Dan Hartman-Lead Vocals and Guitar
Tommy Bruner-Lead guitar and vocals
Jeff Mattison-Lead guitar and vocals
Mitch Smith-Sax
Bart Carfizzi-Keyboards
Steve DeForrest-Bass
R.Smith-Drums
Terry McDowell-Host

Setlist:

Ramblin Man
I'm Ready
Don't Be Cruel

Notes: Rich Magoon was a regular at Rumors till he passed away from cancer last week.  So a celebration of life took place during this special jam occasion.   The place was crowded and plenty of jammers were there.  I still have not figured out how to play Ramblin Man but keep a straight beat and nobody will notice much.  A nice guitar duet between Tommy and Jeff (who replaced Mike Clair since the Bear and his wife had the cold/flu crap.  Nice to jam again with Steve DeForrest on bass.

People bought enough food dishes for me to grab a couple sandwiches and some brownies, to which Joe Hutchcroft said be careful they might be spiked.  Told him if I start seeing rainbows and unicorns within the next 15 minutes to be afraid.  We got a good laugh out of that.

Logic And Lies Live At The Sanctuary

Songs:

It's So Hard
Drawn In The Dark
Let It Go
All We Are
Realitesville
Dear Lisa
Teri My Love
Logic And Lies

(Jim Jacobmeyer: Photo)

The idea of going electric has been etched in my mind for a while, but for the first time ever I did just that.

I didn't expect to acquire another guitar but the situation presented itself while I was at the Maquoketa Pawn Shop.  There stood in the aisle was Fender Telecaster, I had two Strats and both still are played and loved but I fell in love with this Tele and it was a US made guitar, the clerk mentioned it was a 99 model.  So I figured why not, and decided to use this as my electric debut at the Sanctuary in Marion.

Jim gave me the chance to work a hour long set but I decided to do a half hour set before closing.  Ed Butler popped up from Riverside to do a  couple numbers, Alex Tuna did a couple numbers and Colton and Pat Lower did some karaoke.   Colton is a very good singer of Karaoke and Jim and I talked maybe doing a project with Colton doing songs with honest to goodness real instruments.

My Electric set was a mixed bag and I picked the wrong amp for that.  I used my old Telisco amp that my folks gave me for Christmas about 46 years ago.  It's not loud, and it plays cranky, plenty of fuzz tone to it.  My folks only paid 29.95 for both the guitar and amp that they got from K Mart and the guitar died a long time ago. Despite some snap crackle and pop on the knobs the amp plays fine.  It made all the songs sound like punk rock, even Teri My love had a bit too much overdrive to it.  Even though I worked on the song Logic And Lies, my mind drew a blank and I had to start over again.  But this song have gotten quite a bit of a boost from the Sanctuary faithful and they seem to enjoy hearing it.  Some notables who showed up, Phil Koening from the Waubeek jams, Ed Butler from Riverside, Alex Tuna and Becky who used to sing in Blues Zone years ago, she played more folk than blues.  My set was simply noisy and a bit too much punk rock.  A rethink is probably needed next time if I go electric.

Interesting night though.

(Below: Fender Telecaster bought today at the pawnshop for 800 dollars.   It's a made in USA version made in 1999. It's seen a few gigs but it does sound great despite the 20 dollar amp that I used at the Sanctuary)

Checker's Acoustic Showcase-The Philosopher's Stone

Set List:

The Race Is On*
The Kids Are Alright*
Fever
Poor Poor Pitiful Me*
Let Your Love Flow
Light My Fire/I Always Wanted To Be With You/Cinnamon Girl
Gold Dust Woman (Julie Gordon; Lead Vocals)
For What's Its Worth (Julie Gordon Lead Vocals)
Little Sister (Julie Gordon: Lead Vocals) *
Everybody's Talking
Sweet Home Chicago (Julie Gordon: Lead Vocals)

*Debut

With:

Julie Gordon-Host, vocals, guitar and percussion
Dave Bonham-Host and lead guitar
Carl Meiners-Guitar and vocals
Skip Richards-Bass and Vocals
David Boston-Sax
Donna Jo Eisner-Backing vocals and percussion
Tim Canfield-Good Vibes

Notes:  There were a few more songs that I played guitar on when Carl Meiners came up on stage and there were a few songs that Julie and Dave did that I wasn't familiar with so I stayed unplugged and off the stage.

I noted the four songs that Julie sang on.  I'm sure she did a few more (Born On The Bayou, Green River, Seven Bridges Road) and I know Carl did some songs that I didn't note (Folsom Prison, Loving Her Was Easier, Sunday Morning Comin Down, Swinging Doors, a couple others that I don't know the name of the song) and Skip did Mustang Sally (?) and Hang On Sloopy.

While The Checker's Showcase wasn't as radical as the Long Branch Showcase, I did play around with the boogie version of Fever and then did a strange medley starting out with Light My Fire which went into I Always Want To Be With You and then finishing up with Cinnamon Girl to which Julie joined me on the second chorus.  I was still dealing with the after effects of having food poisoning courtesy of Taco Bell the other night and it was so dry there, I had to deal with a dry throat.  Not very well since the unsweetened Tea wasn't helping things either. I was losing my voice on Let Your Love Flow which was why I decided to go with the medley and thankfully Julie bailed me out on Cinnamon Girl, by then I had no vocal range whatsover and I needed  to save my voice for my gig tomorrow night.

There were three new debuts of cover songs. Rough go through versions of The Race Is On and Poor Poor Pitiful Me and The Kids Are Alright to which Julie took part of a video of that song.  While I enjoy playing The Who songs, they do sound better with a electric guitar. Hardly anybody paid much attention to the line, "I met a girl down at Checker's Bar instead of the Hyatt House".  For the most part my set ended with Julie singing Gold Dust Woman.  Everybody's Talking was chosen my encore number, Skip playing bass to that and Carl playing guitar.

I thought the crowd would be bigger but Mike Clair was sick, Steve Black Wolf had a couple teeth pulled and rest probably either were working or too tired to show up.  I managed to chat with Tim Canfield on drums and guitar for a while. Somehow the talk turned into Donna Jo coming over to talk about going to see America this weekend and she paid 250 dollars to go see Van Morrison, only to get annoyed with that concert.  He was such a moody and pompous bastard she said.   And then it was back to America and the song that was covered by the Captain And Tenille, Muskrat Love.  To which all parties all agreed that America did the better version.

BTW-Muskat Love was written by Willis Alan Ramsey.

Whittier Acoustic Showcase-Rumors Wess Side Jam

Setlist:  Whittier Acoustic Showcase 11/11/17

Can't You See*
I Won't Back Down*
Simple Man*
Everybody's Talking*
Fever
Teri My Love

* Jeff Overly-Lead Vocal (Can't You See, Simple Man), Alto Saxophone

Rumor's Jam  11/12/17

Mustang Sally
Drift Away

Mitch Smith-Sax and Vocal (Mustang Sally)
Kim Trevellion-Lead Vocal (Drift Away)
Mike Clair-Guitar
Lenny Munn-Bass
Greg Mein-Keyboards
Brenda Hoskins-Mein-Backing Vocals
Terry McDowell-Host
R.Smith-Drums


For Saturday, Jeff popped in early and helped out on the first four songs before moving over to The Frog to help out Karl Hudson.  Probably the most folks who joined the Whittier Acoustic Showcase but most of them started to leave after 9 and the final song of the night was Teri My Love which ended at 9:45.  Then I ended up going to see Four Day Creep/Flex to celebrate Tami Soukup's 50th birthday bash.


A lot of jammers and drummers popped in on Sunday at Rumors, despite me getting there about 4:30, I didn't play till quarter till 7  8 drummers were there in front of me.  Jeff had to cut out around 6 to get back home to take care of teacher's things he does at his school.   So, I didn't jam with Jeff, nor Greg and Brenda but Greg and Brenda stayed around to help me on the songs.  First time I got to jam with Lenny, who plays in Crankshaft with Mitch.  Kim from Blue Scratch volunteered with Drift Away.

Notes:  The debut of Jiffy Pop, the new side project of Kipp Wieland played four songs of bubble gum but instead of playing keyboards, he played guitar and sang.  Interesting set of songs, Gallery's Nice To Be With You and The Turtles' Eleanor and It's A Heartache.  Dave Kelsey, who played guitar, was part of the long ago FOAD band that I did with Mike Swearingen.  For a guy that used to be part of MOX NIX and a KISS tribute band, it's sure a long way from the rock and roll to the bubblegum sound of these songs. I'll give them this, at least they had a good sense of humor in singing these songs. Kipp did play keyboards later on with other jammers.  I didn't get to talk to Kelsey, he might have left after the Jiffy Pop played.  I doubt if he would have remembered me 32 years after the fact.

(Tom Krejci: Credit)

(Rick Novak-his FB page, I'm thinking this is the same guy that played in Stone Garden)

Archives:  The Original Stone Garden was a powerhouse band led by Virgil Hanson and Craig Spratt in the late 1960s and early 70s.  After Paraphernalia/Tyrus went on hiatus Mike Swearingen drafted me into a new version of the New Stone Garden Band, with Rick Novak and a bass player I can't think the name of, he could have been the original bass player (Bob Jones perhaps?).  We started practicing in April of 1985 and did about a month's worth of songs before Virgil and Rick had a major falling out and the band imploded.  It seems to the be the way of life for me and all of my band endeavors, only band that never imploded have been The Townedgers.   Novak, was part of Stone Garden around 1975 with Hanson, Spratt, Jones and Steve Jennings.  I never thought on how big these guys were, I wasn't familiar with the Iowa Music Scene till I started playing in 1983.  But mostly a who's who of CR musicians did play in that band, the late Barry Binger.  As par for course, I would be a forgotten footnote to the failed reunion of The Stone Garden Band and I'm sure if you talk to Virgil or Rick, that they wouldn't know me, or if they did, it was that I had Zickos Drum Set, and was the only one playing Zickos in town. Spratt does have some other Stone Garden promo pics on his site.  Virgil could be a sort of  an disciplining dude, but Rick was a lot of fun playing guitar with. We talked about forming a band but nothing came of it.  Mike and I would off and on get together on special projects and jams and I drafted him to be part of the Routers in 1992.  Since then, Mike just does karaoke shows when he's healthy.

Long Branch Jam-The Return of Crabby

Song list: (Something To That Effect)

I Won't Back Down
Fever
Light My Fire
Spoonful*
Not Fade Away*
Everybody's Talking
Won't Get Fooled Again
Good Lovin/I Fought The Law/Switch Board Susan
The Last Time
The First Cut Is The Deepest
What's So Funny About Peace Love And Understanding*
No Expectations
Let's Work Together
Sundown
Cinnamon Girl

With:

Alex Tuna
Zac Nickels
Tony Nickels

*debut

The return back to the Long Branch and this is where I decided that we should jam out and extend the songs a bit more.  Zac Nickels played drums and I thought I would throw a few things his way to see how he responds.  Usually it's the other way around, I'm playing drums and doing oddball things to liven up the mood, it's been that way since The Paraphernalia Tyrus years but never done this by playing guitar and seeing how the other drummer would react.

Turns out Zac did a very good job of playing along and seeing where I was taking the song.   In jam situations when you extend a song, you're playing within your heart and soul.  I'm not a fan of electric drums but since that's Zac's drums I figured he'd play them.  The Fever song was Little Willie John's version with a boogie riff, unlike the Peggy Lee version to which Belinda James sings on.  With The Townedgers, we're building off the one note to go into the jams but since I only play guitar via rhythm it tends to be a bit restrictive.   Therefore Alex Tuna, was tapped to add some lead guitar. I have known Alex from the Artisan Sanctuary Jams of note, and he did play at Rumors one time for a couple of songs.  He does originals, that are fairly long (five to six minutes on average).  I'm still trying to fit in playing guitar and singing songs but I'm also using the musicians that do show up.  There's never a big crowd on a Friday Night, most musicians are out playing somewhere or going to bed early.   In my case I took the night off since Tony was looking for some folks to show up.

I'm impressed that the jammers like to jam with me on the songs that I do.  It's becoming well known that my songs start out as jam songs, somewhat done by the record and then we make it up along the way as we go.  Spoonful was one song that was debuted by using the same two notes over and over again.  Repetition of playing the same riffs over and over might become tedious, but if you throw in a off chord key just to spice it up, the song can still be rocking.  I'm still tinkering with the song itself and throwing a rave up 4/4 beat in the jam part but I was happy with the results.

For Light My Fire, it was extended into a crazy little guitar/drummers duel between me and Zac. The new arrangement was thought up earlier in the afternoon and while I debuted that new arrangement, Zac managed to respond to my odd ball guitar riffs.  I think he played in McPhisto years ago but he has a drummer's knack of adding fills and cymbal accents to the songs.  Just like he did with Won't Get Fooled Again.  He managed to get all the cymbal chokes at the end.  Even though he was a bit early but then again we never played the song before.  It sounded nice.

There was a rough go through of What's So Funny About Peace Love And Understanding, but that was the first time I played it and despite the wrong notes I got good response from the 3 people in attendance.  As for the bizarre medley of Good Lovin/I Fought The Law, that was thought up on the spot.  Nevertheless, this turned out to be a very long set about 90 minutes to the final ending of Cinnamon Girl.   Alex did fairly well of playing guitar on the songs but since Tony had his dad playing drums for last night, I decided to really use him on the songs and see where they would lead.

He really did make me sound that much better than usual.  Not saying it was like with The Townedgers but they're learning and so am I.

Checker's Acousta Crabby Showcase 11/8/17

Songs:

Logic And Lies
Light My Fire
Switch Board Susan
In The Midnight Hour
Everybody's Talking
Tulsa Time
Sundown
Ring Of Fire
Lodi
I Won't Back Down
Eve of Destruction
Good Lovin
Suspicious Minds
Boobieful
Sweet Home Alabama

With:

Steve Black Wolf (Vocals-Lodi, I Won't Back Down, Eve Of Destruction)
Donna Jo Eisner (Percussion, backing vocals, Sundown, Tulsa Time)
Lorie Parker- Lead vocal-Boobieful
Cathy Hart-Lead vocal-Sweet Home Alabama
Willie Morris: Guitar (Vocals:Suspicious Minds)

Wess Side Jam-November 5

Setlist:

Going Up The Country
Amie
Sister Golden Hair
Little Wing
Heard It In A Love Song

With:

Greg Mein-Lead Vocals and Guitar
Brenda Hoskins-Mein-Keyboards and Flute
Tommy Bruner-Lead Guitar
Bruce Bingman-Bass and lead vocal on Sister Golden Hair
R.Smith-Drums

And

Tush

Me on vocals
Mike Clair on Guitar
Dave Bonham on Guitar
Jeff Langenberg-Bass
Mike Lint-Drums

Terry McDowell-Host

Much to my surprise Greg and Brenda showed up to do the Wess-side jam on Sunday and even more of a surprise they personally asked Terry to let me play drums on their songs.   We talked about getting together to jam during previous jams but they got paired up by the wrong drummers that didn't know their songs.  And I was around them both long enough to know what songs they are playing.  Greg is a talented guitarist, he is in Crazy Delicious, a band that I have been priming to see but everything they played somewhere I had a gig of my own.  Four of the five songs that they did were played yesterday in Waubeek.  And for the first time I got to play Going Up The Country.

I think Greg was impressed that I knew the songs they played, the breaks and where to put them.  His take on Little Wing differs from the version that I did with the Wiley Kats, more simpler and they don't take on the coda from Derek And The Dominoes.   Brenda can play flute and the keyboards, I love their version of Heard It In A Love Song.  I thought they would attempt to do The Weight but perhaps they might have played that earlier in the showcase before I got there.  A big surprise: Greg didn't play any Tom Petty.

NOTES: There was a friend of Renee (Wife to the Bear) Brian, I think his name, was supposed to play but the guy crashed and burned and put a few dents in Terry's drum heads. While Mike Clair got him to play Kansas City Blues okay, the dude couldn't make heads or tails out of Wonderful Tonight and had too much to drink.   They were going to do the song Tush but they couldn't find anybody to sing it, so I jumped on stage and sang it.  Mike Lint then replaced Crash And Burn Brian.  Tami Soukup took part of a video of me horsing around on stage and Dave Bonham added a lotta wah wah to the lead. I could probably sing more lead on future jams but I still feel weird without a guitar in hand or behind the drum set.

While Greg didn't play Tom Petty, Karl Hudson did.  You can guess which song he did play.  He also a version of Can't You See with a snippet of Hey Jude towards the end.

Two weeks ago, I jammed with Steve DeForest on the Kyle Oyloe 2 years remembered jam.  He plays in Crazy Delicious with Greg.

Ernest The Soul Man really came on strong with his Twist/Bring It On Home To Me medley, and afterwards he wondered why I haven't been behind the drums. I told him it's process of elimination, I played earlier in the jam and retired for the night, except for that impromptu version of Tush.  Told Ernest that it's Terry's call, and usually Terry can back up Ernest quite well  Being Ernest he talked about getting a upcoming gig and he was going to tap me into playing a few songs.  I told him if I'm not working or not having a acoustic jam gig I'd be happy to.

Barb Myers came up for a rare performance of Rain and Helter Skelter and Bobby McGee.  She has a bigger stage fright than me but I think she did a nice job on Rain.  Joe Hutchcroft helped out on drums.

I really have not sat down and talked to Jeff Langenberg all that much but he's has been a part of my musical trip when I'm fronting a band.  He was part of the Tush jammers with Mike Clair who's been a big boost to my exposure to play events such as Vinton and Rubies Benefit. Jeff is a solid bass player, economical and doesn't do a lot of fancy playing.  He's very good.  In fact I have yet to hear a sub par bass player in my return to the stage.

While last weekend, it was Julie and Ryan getting me back on stage and me associating with them most of the evening.  This weekend it was Greg and Brenda that became the major players.

It was another capacity crowd and lot of jammers along for the ride.  

Weekend Jams-Acousta Crabby Takes Waubeek

Set list;

O Death
Everybody's Talking
For What's It Worth
Dead Flowers
Summertime Blues
The Last Time (encore)

With
Greg Mein
Brenda Hoskins-Mein

and other jammers.

Waubeek sits on the banks of the Wapsipinicon River about 10 miles away from my place.  Last time I went up there I stayed for a brief moment after doing a Waterloo bargain hunt.  This time I figured I'd give this a go.

The place was packed. They had a Halloween costume night and people dressed up.  I'm not big on packed crowds and at times thought about leaving once again.  It's cold, it's November and FB and Company still have one GD fly that kept bothering me last night and a couple had to bring their youngster up there and believe it or not I had to entertain the poor kid at times.  The couple would bicker and cuss and then cuddle up and make out and then bicker and cuss again.  That was a sign of things to come.

The Costume party was weird and surreal.  A lot of the early jammers came up and did original songs.  Most could not sing. Some couldn't play either.  The electric drums didn't help much.  Trevor Worcel and his dad sat in with Ron LaFleur on his set and they did a interesting version of Billy Jean and concluded with A Thousand Horses's Smoke.  And then he threw a tirade about something and left the place soon afterwards. Trevor got picked up by a young woman who danced with him on a song, I think she was into him but Trevor and his dad wanted to go home.   Some guy butchered The Weight, so Greg ended up doing something else, Heard It In A Love Song, the Tom Petty songs.  I could see myself working with him on something in the future.

Once Mr. Bi Polar left the place, the bar begin to thin out and by the time I got do my set, most of the costume wearing people went home and Big Mo and Dakota were in the process of loading up themselves. So what better way to scare off the people, play O Death.  I might put that song in the archives, but I did that song for shock value. I got another jammer (Daniel I think his name was) to help out on Everybody's Talking and For What's It Worth, Greg Mein came up to play guitar and that song turned out the highlight.  I could have played longer but my Ibanez had other ideas and broke a string on Dead Flowers, the second time that has happened this year which is beginning to irritate me. However, since everybody liked my performance a guy stepped in and I borrowed his Martin for Summertime Blues.

Afterwards, the house band and Greg and his wife Brenda came up to do a few songs and I sang backup to Can't You See and The Last Time, to which Brenda and I did a call and response to his lead vocals.  I thought about doing The Last Time but forgot all about it till Greg sang it.

And after that a big fight erupted between a couple of good ole boys from the city, it started at the door and ended up going around the bar scattering people into the night and chairs went flying. For some reason I started singing The Monster Mash. By the time I left that place Two Linn Country Sheriff cars came racing down the road through the fog. However, the folks at FB and Company were so impressed with my performance that they said they would like to see me back next month.  I may take them up on their offer, providing if it's not too crowded and the good ole boys stay in the city.

Rumors Jam-I'm So Glad You're All Here With Me Tonight

Rumors Jam Wess Side Halloween Bash

Hosts: Terry McDowell, Mike Clair,Dan Johnson, Tommy Bruner

Special guest stars: Greg Mein, Brenda Hoskins-Mein, Julie Gordon, Ryan Matthew Paul, Tim Canfield, Ian Jacoby, Mike Lint, Rob Haskell

Plus: Tami Soukup, Brenda Snow, Ann Mishmash,Richie the black guy, Mike, the bar regular, Sonya Adair, bartender extraordinaire and the Rumors crowd.

(Photo: Tami Soukup;  Jeff Overly, R.S., Dave Bonham)
The Band:

Mike Clair-Guitar
Dave Bonham-Guitar and vocals
Jeff Overly-Bass and vocals
Bob Gleason-Harmonica
R.Smith-Drums

Songs;

Keep Your Hands To Yourself
All Along The Watchtower
La Grange
Hey Joe
Roadhouse Blues

I really didn't think I was going to play all three nights.  Hanging with Dreams Of Arcadia on Friday and Saturday Night and actually playing a lot of songs on guitar in Anamosa and Solon really wiped me out for Sunday.  Even if I didn't do the whole 200 mile trek like Julie and Ryan did on Friday, I still really was feeling the effects, especially Saturday Night and the usually reliable Mexican place in Solon ended up giving me Montezuma's Revenge and a splitting headache afterwards.  Despite that the Solon D.O.A. duo became a improvised return of the Acousta Crabby.

Nevertheless the flu bug has taken over most of the jammers this month.  Both Julie and Ryan were still fighting the cold, Karie Skogman had to miss the Rumor's Friday night gig and while I still had sinus problems and still feeling sluggish from all the fun of the past two nights, I was feeling much better than the past couple weekends.  The debate about doing Stone City came up but once Jeff Overly was still in town, I'd would go help him out.

Usually in band playing, I back people up by playing drums.  In the case of Jeff, he was that rare performer that I actually played more on guitar than drums so this was a rare occasion. Second of all, this marked the first time that I jammed with Dave Bonham in months, we go back to days of Wrigleyville that we were regulars on that jam scene, which now seems so long ago.  Since the hosts of Tommy and Dan were playing and needed a break, Dave would spell Tommy and Jeff would give Dan some time off too.  Mike came back up to help out the our set.

All Along The Watchtower was the Hendrix version although I did incorporate some Dave Mason type of beats there, Ron LaFleur does a nice version of that song although he could never get the words right.  Jeff commented that he blew some lyrics in one of the songs we did but for a jam and not performing them I don't think anybody knew the differences.  Hey Joe was very sloppy on my part, more like a Keith Moon bit of cascading and rolling drums and bashing cymbals but if I had my own set of drums and cymbals it would have been more bombastic.   Jeff and Dave traded off vocals and while Dave wanted me to sing Rocky Mountain Way, I told him somebody would have take over on drums for me to do that. So we concluded with Road House Blues, like La Grange done in that Texas two step shuffle beat that drives me crazy.  But it wasn't that bad.  Despite dropping a drum stick at the end of Keep Yo Hands To Yourself and picking another stick up from the drum, I didn't miss a beat.

I wasn't the only one that dropped a stick.  Terry did on one song at the end and so did Rob Haskall, but Rob was one of the highlights playing a improvised set with Tommy and Dan on Sunshine Of Your Love which turned into Crossroads.   Greg and his wife popped up later to do some Tom Petty songs much to Ryan's dismay.  I really wasn't that surprised that Julie and Ryan did show up around 6:30 and came up to do a couple songs with the host band before the jam concluded with Comfortably Numb which turned out to be one of the best versions that they have done.  Ryan adding some keyboards and Terry mixing it up on drums.  It really did end things on a great note.

NOTES: There was actually a good sized crowd for the jam, although notable no shows was Trevor Worcel not playing on drums.  Which enabled me to play a couple more....I managed to share the table with Tami Soukup, who usually takes videos and pictures of musicians playing....Brenda Snow also showed up as well...Richie, the black dude that I became friends with during the Wrigleyville jams was there but somehow he got into a disagreement with somebody and I really don't know how that started, probably a misunderstanding...Upon going to Rumors, I did managed to do a bit of walking around New Bo area and managed to get back to the car before the rain started up around 4:30...The drummers that did show up and play was Rob, Me and Mike Lint, Jesse Carruthers was there but didn't hang around to play...Mike Clair did play bass on the songs that Greg and Brenda played with Mr. Lint on drums.

Crashing The Dreams Of Arcadia Party (Both Nights)

The weather has gotten colder and more bitter as we reached the end of October.  Not a surprise really but since my regular job has been keeping me busy, I haven't been able to show myself at any jams.  The three week layoff did affect me when I played for the first time since The Artisan Sanctuary Showcase.   I missed out helping Four Day Creep at Jus Coz Friday Night but decided that since The Dreams Of Arcadia was in Anamosa, I owed them a visit since passing the last time they played at Knuckleheads.

Anamosa for a small town has some of the more bizarre folks I have met and that was no exception.  Ryan Paul back in town to help Julie's cause, The Dreams Of Arcadia did a double gig swing, starting in Cedar Falls and then down the snowy and windy path to Knuckleheads to which I thought I would make the the final hour set of there, only to find that they continued to play up till pass the 2 AM cutoff date for bars

Songs (with Julie Gordon-Lead and backing vocal) Knuckleheads-Anamosa 10/27/17

Gold Dust Woman
Cinnamon Girl
For What It's Worth
Kansas City Blues

Ryan should know by now but once he hangs with Julie is that he'll be expected to go the full mile.  For somebody who drove 200 miles to gig, Julie was in fine singing form.  Since I didn't practice much since being idle and sick for most of the three weeks, I had a hard time trying to remember the words to For What Its Worth  but whatever line I missed Julie picked up.  And of course there's always something special when she sings Gold Dust Woman, that did make some of the handful of people at the bar smile and nod in approval.  I did not expect to participate outside of hand drums and such, but Julie finds ways of getting me to play something.  I thought about doing Won't Get Fooled Again, but since I didn't have the words to that, I just thought up of Kansas City on the spot and went with that.

The crowd I could count on one hand but as the night progressed on, a few women dressed up in various outfits came up to dance and flirt with a couple guys for about an hour or so before they disappeared into the night and an older guy popped in around 2 AM to wonder if anybody knew how to play Angel Flying Too Close To The Ground (Willie Nelson) and cursed himself when he couldn't get the chords just right.  That's how it goes when you have not played the song in a while.

Special thanks to Bambi Dahlhauser for being a cool bartender.

(Photo courtesy of Dreams Of Arcadia.  The EYE glasses were a hit, Julie and Ryan dressed up as the Pirates Of The Caribbean gang, Ryan a dead on version  of  Captain Jack Sparrow)

Setlist:

Gold Dust Woman
What's Up
If I Were A Carpenter
For What Its Worth
Good Lovin/La Bamba
Floodlands*
I'll Feel A Whole Lot Better
Everybody's Talking

Jules Gordon: Vocals
Ryan Paul-Percussion on Feel A Whole Lot Better

*debut

(3 AM after getting back home from Solon, just in case nobody had any pics of me playing live)

It was Halloween weekend and everybody packed the Legion Hall for a night of music and fun.  Julie and Ryan dressed up as the Pirates Of The Midway and the only thing I did was to find a pair of eyeball glasses to go with my shirt and people loved that cheap 7.99 eyeball sunglasses that I found at Halloween Express. I actually dancing with one woman when DOA was doing Wagon Wheel.
Certainly it was fun, but I didn't expect to go home with anybody and just like the script went, most of them went home before the midnight hour.

(Ryan and a friend-Kayte Kintz Photo credit)

As you can tell Julie and Ryan are very gracious of giving me some much needed stage time to reacquaint myself with the song that I did play although Julie did notice I was getting too comfortable using songs with D chord opening for the songs, so at that point, I went into Floodlands, an original song from 1989. And the object to stick with more uptempo and uplifting songs, not that I have  a deep song list of uplifting songs, so I dusted off Good Loving and threw La Bamba in as a medley.  And they let me close the whole gig down, by then most of the dancers and folks went home.  For the most part Ryan has mentioned time and time again that's he's not a Tom Petty fan so I was trying to think of some song to cohort him into doing  and I came up with I'll Feel A Whole Lot Better, which in reality was done by The Byrds but Tom Petty did a cover off Full Moon Fever.  I smiled after the song and said Congratulations Ryan, you just did a Tom Petty song.  To which he wanted to kill me on that one but I explained in theory we did the Byrds version.  I could have been more evil and played Listen To Her Heart instead.

I was surprised to see how many songs that I actually did tonight, it was as many songs as I would do at Whittier or the Long Branch.  Since I didn't have a capo I stayed into a comfort of sorts to which Julie noticed, but it seems that most of the stuff I do is based in D chord.  Again this was due to still trying to get back into the swing of things after being away from it for 3 weeks.   With Ryan returning back to the East Coast next week this will put their duo on hold for a couple months.  I think in November that I will be making more showing up at various jams and gigs, I do have a week's worth of vacation time and now the growing season is over I really have no plans of going to Davenport or Madison till next year.

Still dealing with aftereffects of the cold flu, I haven't been 100 percent, and I'm sure Julie and Ryan go through that when they catch the cold.  It didn't help when I got Mexican food for supper and ended running to the toilet when I got to the Legion.  And ended up getting a migraine in the process, so I tended to be a bit wiped out.   In chemistry I have mentioned time and time again that Julie and Ryan do work great together.   I tend to work off the cuff and improvising on the spot, I rarely play a song the same way.  Julie would like to  have a more polish and set arrangements of songs.  I enjoy spontaneity and a jam band mentality.  Make no mistake, I love her to pieces and she forever own Gold Dust Woman when it's time to play that song with anybody in town.  And I do think Ryan could do just a good job, if not better to play Gold Dust Woman.  I can't wait to hear how he would play this song in the future.

And she has played with the best, from the late Kyle Oyloe to Brook Hoover and The Mad Dogs and Luscious Green, and there's a gypsy spirit between her and Ryan that propels D.O.A.  With me, there's a different sort of contrasts, a clashing of the spirits so to speak. What does she think about me playing around the riffs and around her vocals, does it work for her or does it not?  I look out on the floor and see people dancing and singing along to the word and think to myself that I love having her singing the songs.  But I'm not going to push her into any projects or bands that doesn't fit her style.  And besides, I'm the one that has a regular job and have to restrict myself to play on jams or weekend gigs, if any of that comes up.   I support  her band efforts in what she does and watch over her from afar.   I can still work with her on anything if need be. But in the meantime, D.O.A is her priority and once Ryan returns again, they'll be out and about.